You Could Use a PI
by Aurora Sanders
Summary: After being rejected by her best friend, superpowered Jessica Jones throws herself into work in order to distract herself. But when a man capable of mind control shows up to Alias Operations asking for a P.I., she gets more than she bargained for. (Superpower discovery AU)
1. AKA Alias Operations

"You're going to be my P.I."  
Jessica Jones looked up from her cell phone at the rude man outside her office. "You're going to be polite." She didn't have time for assholes right now — she was too busy trying to patch things up with her best friend, Trish, who'd just informed her in the most awkward way possible that no, she did not have feelings for her back.  
The man looked confused, although she couldn't exactly tell through the thick glass window. After a few seconds, he asked "Could you please open the door and let me in? I really need someone's help."  
Jessica sighed and stood up. Maybe dealing with an asshole actually would help her remember that Trish in fact was not one, just one who thought of her as more of a sister than a girlfriend for legitimate reasons having to do with them actually living together for some of their teen years. Trish always wanted to hear about her "interesting" customers, after all.  
"Yes?" she asked, taking in the man. He could be attractive if he shaved more — he looked pretty beat up. The British accent was certainly a plus.  
She could imagine Trish with her, telling her to stop checking out everyone just because she didn't have a girlfriend or boyfriend right now. And Trish would be right.  
"I'm sorry for being rude. I really need help. Will you help me?" the man asked.  
"Sure, whatever." Jessica threw her hands in the air and leaned back against the desk. "Welcome to Alias Operations. My name's Jessica Jones, and as someone's probably already told you, I only take interesting cases. First things first, what's your name?"  
The man took a deep breath, seemingly hesitating on his name. "Zebediah Kilgrave."


	2. AKA Straight for the Sob Story

Kilgrave, huh? Had the neighbors down the street already taken Murdercorpse? Jessica thought to herself, but didn't voice the thought. She had a feeling it would probably piss him off. "So…Zebediah…"

"Just call me Kilgrave," the man commanded.

"Okay, Kilgrave." It was probably a British thing, wanting to be called by his last name. "Tell me about what you're here for."

"Well, my parents abandoned me when I was ten years old, and now that I'm twenty-two and out of college, I'm trying to find them," he answered simply.

"Wow, going straight for the sob story, are we?" Jessica laughed.

"Commanding you didn't work," He shrugged.

Jessica raised an eyebrow. "Does commanding people to do your bidding usually work?"

"Actually, yes," Kilgrave answered with a smile.

"Can't imagine why," She rolled her eyes.

"You're going to like me." he instructed her.

This man was weird. Jessica walked to the other side of her desk, a little bit scared but determined to still feel confident in front of this creep. "Sorry, that has to be earned,"

"You're a challenge. I like you." Was he flirting?

 **New message from Bae** : Jessica, are we okay? I didn't mean to hurt you…

Cursing and making a mental note to change Trish's name back to just Trish in her contacts, Jessica texted back Fine. Just got caught up with a client. How had she interpreted everything between them so wrong that Trish didn't have any feelings towards her? Women were so confusing…But not nearly as confusing as the disturbingly-named man standing in front of her.

"Sorry, I'm taken," Jessica told him, flashing the screen in Kilgrave's face. Trish had given her permission to pretend to be in a relationship with her whenever a creep hit on her, after all, and Jessica could only hope that permission hadn't been revoked because of last night.

"Too bad. Will you be my P.I. anyway?" Kilgrave asked her, flashing her a smile. Looked like he was relying on charm instead of ordering her around. She couldn't imagine for the life of her why simply ordering around people worked for this man. Maybe it was something like her mysterious ability to jump so high that Trish had many times jokingly suggested that Jessica should try flying, too.

"Sure, why not?" She shrugged. It would be a good distraction from her love life, which was currently in shambles.

"Enthusiastic." He said dryly.

"Sorry, my enthusiasm has to be earned," Jessica laughed.

"Well then, I plan to make it my mission to earn it. I think we're going to have a lot of fun working together, Jessica Jones." And there was that smile again.


	3. AKA A Lucky Girl

"Okay, so we're going to not have dinner, then," Trish Walker sighed, looking at her best friend.

"You know I never do that. Let's just go get drinks," Jessica suggested, pulling gently on Trish's arm.

Or at least she thought it was gently, until Trish glared at her with a pained expression on her face. "You need to learn to control your strength. But fine. Drinks it is."

It was true. Jessica did need to control her strength, but she had other important things to worry about — like her slowly falling apart friendship with her best friend. So drinks it was, so that Jessica would be comfortable saying everything she shouldn't. This was becoming too much of a pattern for Trish's taste, but she wasn't sure if she needed to intervene just yet.

"So…sisters, right?" Trish asked after a drink. "That's okay, right? I love you, Jess, you know that, but I just don't think about you that way."

Okay, so maybe Jessica had hoped that if Trish was drunk, she'd rethink her immediate rejection of the other day. Trish always seemed more flirty with alcohol in her system. But no.

"Yeah…yeah, it's fine," Jessica ran a hand through her hair, tired of things being awkward. "So…how's work?" It was a lame question, but she didn't really have anything else to ask.

Trish was about to answer when a man much drunker than either of them put a hand on Trish's shoulder. "Want me to buy you a drink, sweetheart?"

"Get away from my girlfriend!" came almost involuntarily out of Jessica's mouth — her typical Trish-approved response for when some jerk was hitting on her best friend. They were pretty complicated. Trish's mouth formed an O, but she didn't say anything.

"Or what?" he sneered.

"Or I'll twist your arm behind your back and break it." Jessica told the creep confidently.

"You think you could actually do that?" He laughed.

"Yes." Jessica told him confidently. "And I'll prove it to you. Do Strength Test with me. If you lose, you leave us alone."  
"And when I win?" he asked.

"You buy her a drink." Jessica was angrier than she'd been in a long time, angrier than that night when she was 13 that she didn't want to think about. She'd been dealing with too many assholes today.

The man turned to his buddy — Kilgrave — laughing at the prospect of a girl beating him at Strength Test. Which just made Jessica even angrier.

She walked up to the machine and inserted a coin, making the lights flash, and swung at the fist. The machine whined, and then was unresponsive.

The man ran up to the machine, battering it with his fists, but it didn't make a sound.

"I believe you owe Jessica and her girlfriend an apology. Go on, apologize. Grovel." Kilgrave instructed his friend with a fire burning behind his eyes.

The man quite literally dropped to his knees and looked up at Trish with his hands clasped together. "I'm so, so sorry," he declared, tears running down his face.

"Good. You may leave the bar now. Go." Kilgrave told the man with a flick of his hand.

Trish looked at Jessica with a raised eyebrow. "Do you know him?"

"Client," Jessica told her.

"Shouldn't you be grateful for your girlfriend helping you? You're a lucky girl. Your Jessica really is something special. You should kiss her." Kilgrave suggested with a smirk.

Something that Jessica couldn't decipher washed over Trish's face as she leaned forward to kiss Jessica. But as soon as their lips touched, Jessica pushed her away. She wouldn't do this, let this man with the mysterious ability to order people around force her best friend who thought of her as a sister kiss her.

"You're an asshole," she hissed.

"What?" Kilgrave threw his hands up in the air with a smirk. "All I did was…"

Before he could even finish his sentence, Jessica was pushing him away with more strength than she'd ever used, even accidentally. He crashed through the tall window of the bar, causing glass to shatter everywhere.

Everyone's eyes were on her and it felt like Jessica had woken up from a nap she'd been taking ever since the car crash. She walked to the door, pushing away anyone who tried to get in her way, and looked at the glass shattered on the street with a half smile on her face.

Why not see if she could fly?

"I'm fine, don't worry about me. This was all a very entertaining form of performance art," Kilgrave said casually, scrolling back into the bar after Jessica had left and over to Trish.

"What…What did I just do?" Trish demanded.

"Go home now and forget about it. You were drunk and it meant nothing. She won't mind." He told her smoothly.

"But what…how did you know? How did you know she was special?" Trish asked, managing to hold onto the words he'd told her before her legs took her out of the bar.

"Superheroes know their own kind," Kilgrave answered quietly as she left.


	4. AKA It's a Deal

Light filtered through the curtains as Jessica opened her eyes to an unfamiliar room, and her chest was filled with panic. Last night was a blur — the alcohol plus the head injury she knew had happened combined to a horrible headache and a fractured memory.

"Jessica, how are you doing?" Seriously? This asshole? If Jessica'd had a choice, she would've decided immediately against letting him take her home to take care of her. But at least he seemed concerned.

"Not entirely sure what happened. What happened?" she asked, brushing her hair off her. "Oh my God. We didn't have sex, did we?" That would be the logical assumption following having gone home with him, but she didn't feel like she'd had sex.

"No, but I'm flattered that you think you would've consented to having sex with me." Kilgrave answered.

Jessica rolled her eyes. "Please cut the flirting and just tell me what happened and how I ended up here."

"Well, you tested out whether you had an ability to fly or not. It turned you didn't, but you could jump very high. And eventually you got tired and crashed, and I brought you home. It's not really that amazing." He shrugged.

"Not really that amazing?!" Jessica demanded, standing up fast and making her head spin. "Kilgrave, I have superpowers!" It was all coming back to her now — the bar…getting mad and pushing Kilgrave out of the bar. Literally.

"And now you're remembering how you came to discover your super-strength, aren't you?" Kilgrave asked, wincing.

"Yes, and you're an asshole." Jessica sighed.

"I presumed you'd say that, but how else was I supposed to help you discover your powers? You needed a push to be able to stop holding back your strength and realize how strong you really were." He shrugged.

"But you didn't have to involve Trish." Jessica hissed.

"But that would be the most effective way of making you realize your powers, using your girl — oh, wait, she's not your girlfriend, is she?" He smiled.

In a second, Jessica was off the floor, paying no mind to her injuries, and pinning Kilgrave against the wall. "How dare you. The relationship between me and Trish is none of your business, and certainly not yours to meddle with."

A look washed over Kilgrave's face — perhaps one regretting ever teaching Jessica about her super strength. "Alright, alright! I'm sorry. I did make her forget what happened, so there won't be any awkwardness between you two. Or at least, no more than there already is."

"How did you make her forget it?" Jessica asked with a raised eyebrow, backing off a little

Kilgrave took a deep breath and continued. "I told you. People typically do what I tell them to do. That's my superpower. But I'm not exactly sure how to control it, either. Or should I say — I don't know how to use it for good, and I want to. Good like helping you discover your superpowers."

"What, so you're looking for someone to teach you to be a moral person?" Jessica scoffed. "I think you're looking at the wrong person, Kilgrave."

"I just thought it would be a good idea. I could help you learn to control your physical superpowers, and you could help me use my powers for good…starting with helping me find my parents in hope that they could help me with the superpowers they left me with," He shrugged.

"Why me?" Jessica asked, still skeptical.

"Well…because you're a P.I. A superpowered one," Kilgrave explained, and in response to Jessica's glare sighed and added "…okay. And because you're the only person I've ever met who I can't order around, and I need to know that whoever's helping me is doing it voluntarily. Since I'm doing the whole trying to be a hero thing."

Jessica looked at him skeptically. She could use someone to help prevent further head injuries. "What the hell. It's a deal."


	5. AKA Don't Know the Half of It

"What I don't get is how I could just forget an entire night!" Trish declared, pacing in front of Jessica's desk

"Trish, it happens all the time. People get drunk, they forget what happened. You had a lot to drink. It was an awkward night," Jessica shrugged.

"But I don't want to forget," Trish leaned against the wall, running a hand through her hair in annoyance. "You know things have been hard between us, Jess, and I don't want to black out and make things even more complicated. Just tell me, please. What did I do? Did I have —"

"No. You did not have sex with me. I would not let that happen. You literally told me a few days ago that we were best friends and not girlfriends. I respect you," As demonstrated by her behavior at the pub. God, this was frustrating. Why couldn't she just explain everything to Trish? Well, the answer was obvious — just like Trish, she didn't want to make things more complicated. Also, why did Trish think she might've had sex with Jessica? Maybe her best friend wasn't as straight, or as non-incestuous, as she claimed to be.

Trish let out a small smile. "I know. I just...I worried,"

Jessica smiled back, and then looked down at her phone and sighed. Kilgrave had sent her four texts in a row about how confused he was that she didn't respond to his mind control powers. Apparently boundaries weren't a thing when you'd been able to get what you wanted your whole life by ordering people around.

No more texts. I'm trying to focus. We can bounce around theories when I'm done, she replied.

He replied back almost immediately. Sorry.

Won't do it again.

Finally, someone who used that emoji correctly. Jessica knew way too many people who mistook it for the happy one.

"Frustrating client?" Trish asked.

Jessica laughed. "You don't know the half of it," In a few days, most of Jessica's perception of the world had been irreversibly altered. She finally knew why she'd always felt different, and she knew that there was someone who could hypnotize people.

"Tell me about it?" Trish asked, sitting down on the edge of Jessica's desk.

"Sorry, I've got to get this research done. Being a PI involves actual work, after all," Jessica laughed.

"Going out to bars can totally count as research though. You can find a lot of things there," Trish suggested.

"Not when the people you're looking for are probably in England," Jessica shrugged.

Three hours later, Jessica hadn't found out much about Albert and Louise Thompson besides the fact that there were lots of other people looking for them. That was a start at least, right?

Armed with her new information about the long list of people around "Kilgrave" (actually Kevin, his real name was a lot more boring)'s age who wanted to find his parents, she headed over to his flat.

" Fi nally, Jessica, you're here," Kilgrave/Kevin said as she put the folder down on the table.

"Research takes time, you know," she scoffed, putting the folder down on the table.

"Yes but—" His rant was cut off when his eyes landed on the photos of the other children. Well, they were adults now. This was probably good, because his commentary wouldn't have been anything useful.

"What?" she asked.

"That woman," he said, pointing to a headshot of a smiling blonde. "She tried to kill my parents."


End file.
